McNaughtan's Bookshop

A charming little book full of quotes on the pleasures and importance of books, including some wisdom from Louisa May Alcott. Also pictured is the compiler’s sweet dedication to his wife.

As the dried leaves rattle in the wind and the days darken, we have scoured our stock for some deliciously macabre and fantastical titles. What will you be reading as the veil grows thin?

It’s a crisp and bright autumn day and we’ve found some books on the Bayeux Tapestry to adorn our window display!

An 18-year-old Michael Moorcock imagines internet newspaper subscriptions on the editorial page of Tarzan Adventures vol. 7 no. 49

All set up for the September PBFA one-day Edinburgh Book Fair! We’re in the Augustine Church on George IV Bridge until 4pm today only.

Hive mind gather round! Do you recognise this man on the right? He was likely an actor, perhaps a director, and worked with Beckett, almost certainly on a British production of Waiting for Godot. The photograph we can roughly date to sometime between 1956-1970.

Had to wait 30 minutes to get a clear shot of our stand between crowds here at the York Book Fair - open today until 7pm and back again Saturday!

From the boards of Alasdair Gray’s 1983 collection ‘Unlikely Stories, Mostly’ and later slightly adapted for the wall of the Scottish Parliament; Gray himself always acknowledged he had paraphrased it from Canadian poet Dennis Lee.

After a busy August, we are busy refilling the shelves, so here’s a peek at this week’s recently priced secondhand. Here’s to autumn and all the cosy evenings of reading ahead!

One of our latests lists is devoted entirely to James Joyce material— first and early editions and publications, letters, scholarship, and even this gorgeous children’s book based on a letter Joyce wrote to his grandson, inspired by a French folk tale.

We take a lot of pride in parcelling books safely and securely for their journey to your home library— here you can see a gathering of parcels destined for customers near and far. Whether you order online or build a stack here in the shop that exceeds your luggage limit, we’ve got you covered!

Before becoming a bookseller, I already loved marbled paper, but in handling more and more antiquarian books, I have become incredibly fond of paste-paper— pictured here as the endpapers in this eighteenth-century binding.

There’s been a complete power cut to the shop which means we’ve had to close early. We’ll be back open from 11am on Saturday 22nd.

As the first weekend of Fringe kicks off, we thought we’d highlight some lovely little secondhand treasures in our drama section. Wishing everyone an excellent festival season!

Does anybody recognise this view? It’s from a late-Victorian collection of photographs undergoing cataloguing, with the bulk of the other 100+ images being of places in Edinburgh, Fife or the Borders. This one has me stumped though. Any leads gratefully received.

Thought we’d hop on the Odyssey bandwagon and share the copy on our shelves at the moment— the first duodecimo printing of Pope’s landmark translation, printed over 1725-1726 in five volumes. The fifth volume also includes Pope’s translation of Homer’s Battle of the Frogs and Mice.

Things found in books, an occasional series: a purchase receipt from @quaritch1847.bsky.social , dated 1899, in this 1888 angling book.

One of the pleasures of working with secondhand books is that our shelf divisions and categories are in a constant state of flux to serve our ever-changing stock. We’ve been lucky to get our hands on a comprehensive collection of social history focusing on the early modern period in Europe.

Austen Alert!! It’s incredibly rare that we have not just one, not just two, but all six of Jane Austen’s finished novels, both as individual copies and as a handsome 1940s set printed in Oxford. So head down to the shop or email us if you’re too far to browse in person.

The sunlight struck this shelf of stunning bindings so perfectly as we opened the shop this morning. Couldn’t help but capture the moment, after a dozen or so attempts.

Some striking patterned wrappers and boards from books around the shop today.

A delightfully louche advert for Jay Landesman’s Polytantric Press, advertising their new Soho home, from the rear of a 1978 poetry journal. The Fingertip Massage Parlour is long gone, although the St Moritz Club seems to still be there. Polytantric’s office is now an opticians.

Don’t you hate it when you run out of fleur-de-lis ornamental type and you have to sneak in a wee thistle? Whether done on purpose or by accident, this little variation by a seventeenth century printer has delighted this bookseller today.

Behold! The National Monument as it could have been! Enjoying the illustrations in this 1906 appeal to the Scottish people to join the author’s call for funds from the government to complete the acropolis on Calton Hill.

A splendid sun hiding in the margin of Isaac Vossius’s 1685 collection of essays Variarum Observationum Liber, currently on the #cataloguersdesk

We’re back at the Augustine United Church for the PBFA June one-day book fair - a selection from stock on display and a bumper crop of other exhibitors as well. Here until 4pm today!

A rather fanciful view of St Bernard’s Well, followed by the artist’s justification of it on the errata leaf. Taken from John Stoddart’s Remarks in Local Scenery & Manners in Scotland, published in 1801

A little celebration of libraries in our window today! We are lucky to have the @natlibscot.bsky.social & over 30 public libraries, making Edinburgh the first UNESCO City of Literature. Check out @scottishbooktrust.bsky.social & @cilipscotland.bsky.social for more on why libraries matter.

Delighted by the Carlisle binder’s ticket in this little nineteenth century book. J. Slee has clearly done lovely work, even if the book has seen some wear over time.

I love this category of typographic blunder. I blogged about my favourite one of these I’ve seen: universityofglasgowlibrary.wordpress.com/2016/08/23/b...

That letter ‘S’ after the apostrophe on the top line is a bit of an afterthought, J. Boyle, printer of Aberdeen. He perpetrated this typographical horror in 1788 so I’ve probably left it a bit late to complain.

Found tucked inside a copy of Edinburgh Fugitive Pieces by William Creech from 1815, currently on the #cataloguersdesk

The Firsts London preview evening is in full swing and we have a stand full of lovely books!

Great author photographs of our time: an occasional series. Laurie Lee reclines in Cyprus, 1945.

A fresh window full of stunning photography books! It’s a perfect day for perusing art and gathering inspiration for your own photographic wanderings.